Hi everybody,
In this July update, we will start our research with a Scotch and a Two Knights Defence, before moving on to the Spanish, and in particular two very interesting games played in the Anti-Marshall. This line is very important at the moment and we will often return to this subject in future updates, Olivier

Spanish: Bird's Defence

In this line of the Bird's defence my opponent came up with this surprising idea 7...a5, threatening to win my bishop:

I did not refute it completely but gained a small edge. Than the game became very tense and interesting but I missed a simple move in a complex ending and then could not win anymore, see Renet - Jirka.

Berlin Defence

In the game Hou Yifan- Ruan Lufei, one of the most talented girls in the world, Hou Yifan, only 12 years old, makes a very strong impression:

Black has just erred, allowing White to roll with her dangerous kingside pawn majority. I believe Hou Yifan will quickly be the women's World Champion, and then who knows? Maybe she will play a match with Carlsen for the men's world crown!

Archangel

Next we have a very interesting novelty from Ivanchuk in the Archangel (or Moëller Attack) of the Ruy Lopez. In a standard position Ivanchuk played the very interesting new move 11 Na3:

Shirov decided to transpose with 11...d6 and followed his old game with Topalov from 1996, but then Ivanchuk caught him again with a another new move that I was very proud to have already found in the June update of 2005. Then Shirov defended with great accuracy and escaped by a miracle, don't miss Ivanchuk - Shirov.

Anti-Marshall

Aronian played a very interesting plan where he gained a queen for 3 pieces but Ivanchuk played better and did not miss his chance when Aronian made a mistake.

In Svidler - Jenni Black came up with a new idea on move 13 of the 8..Bb7 Anti-Marshall, 13...Rb8:

However, he very quickly found himself in a bad position that Svidler exploited with the utmost energy.

Graf System of the Keres Defence

Finally, some analysis from the game Anand - Bruzon of the previous update. Thanks to one of our subscriber's vigilance a very obvious mistake was found in the analysis.

Here in the diagram position Black can simply play 27...fxg6 and refute White's attack. This means that my promised refutation of the Graf line does not work. I am still sure that White's position is better though, and I will come back to it when I find a proper solution.